Herve Falciani detained in Spain at request of Switzerland

MADRID, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Computer expert and former HSBC Bank employee, Herve Falciani, who is accused of filtering the fiscal details of over 130,000 bank clients, was arrested here on Wednesday when attending an event at Pontificia de Comillas University, Spanish police have confirmed.

Falciani was arrested due to the extradition order issued by Swiss authorities for Falciani for releasing the list which revealed thousands of possible cases of tax evasion connected to undeclared accounts in the Geneva office of the British bank.

He now faces extradition and a possible sentence of five years in prison for economic espionage.

He had previously been detained in Barcelona in 2012 on the same charges, although in 2013 Spain refused to extradite him to Switzerland because the information he filtered "referred to suspicious activities of doubtful legality, including possible criminal actions."

Falciani's arrest comes at a delicate moment in relations between Spain and Switzerland after Spain issued a European detention order for crime of rebellion against Catalan separatists Anna Gabriel and Marta Rovira, who are currently in exile in the Alpine country.

Switzerland has so far failed to arrest the them, arguing that the accusation is political in nature. Enditem